Izmir: The First Juderia

Dating back to the Hellenistic and Roman periods, the Jewish heritage of Izmir exhibits a
unique character with its dominant Sephardic traditions of religion and culture.
Some preserved and some in ruins, examples of magnificent synagogues built during the
previous centuries in Izmir, remain today within the First Juderia. They constitute a living
testimony to community’s life in Izmir, which was one of the most spectacular of its kind and
had the most spiritual and cultural influence on all Jewish diaspora communities in the 17th
and 18th centuries.